Event information

19 April 2021, 18:30-20:00

Tactical Decision Making on Targeting: A Comparative Overview of Counter-Insurgency and Near-Peer Scenarios

Military Briefings

A U.S. Marine fires an M240B machine gun at a target during a company attack exercise at Fort A.P. Hill A U.S. Marine fires an M240B machine gun at a target during a company attack exercise at Fort A.P. Hill

Soldiers have to make split second decisions about whether to kill or risk their lives to let the situation develop further. These decisions are informed by the soldiers’ knowledge of the laws governing armed conflicts, their rules of engagement, and common sense. Importantly, their training and prior experiences can also have a significant role in such targeting decisions, even though the law on targeting regulating the two scenarios remains the same.

In this Military Briefing, we will look into how decisions on targeting take place in practice in contextually different conflicts and the operational difficulties involved in the process.

Speaker

Molly Kovite is the Registered In-House Council at the Open Philanthropy and a Judge Advocate with the US Army Reserves. As a reservist, she serves as a professor of National Security Law at The Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School. Prior to joining Open Philanthropy, she worked as the Senior Legal Advisor for the International Humanitarian Law Team at the American Red Cross.

She holds a BA in Political Science from Columbia University, a MA in International Relations from Dublin City University, and a JD from the New York University School of Law.

During her active duty service with the US Army, she deployed twice in Afghanistan, where she provided legal advice to commanders on ongoing operations to ensure compliance with legal requirements and guidelines, including conducting on-the-spot evaluations on airstrikes of moving targets. She has written on the notion of direct participation in hostilities at the tactical level as well as gender in the military.

Online

This Military Briefing will take place online on the platform Zoom.

To follow it, click on this link.

About the Military Briefings

Military Briefings are a unique series of events relating to military institutions and the law. They aim to improve our students’ knowledge of military actors and operations and build bridges between the military and civilian worlds.

MORE ON THIS THEMATIC AREA

ICRC Conference Booth News

Challenging Preconceptions About International Humanitarian Law

13 November 2024

At the 34th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, we hosted a booth with Geneva Call and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Norway.

Read more

disops News

Impact of digital disinformation unpacked in new research brief series

9 April 2025

Our new series of Research Briefs examine the impact of digital disinformation and potential solutions for its regulation

Read more

Event

Strengths and Challenges of Inter-State Applications Before the European Court of Human Rights

22 May 2025, 18:30-20:00

In this Geneva Academy Talk Judge Lətif Hüseynov will discuss the challenges of inter-State cases under the ECHR, especially amid rising conflict-related applications.

Read more

Warzone Event

Advanced IHL Seminar for Academics and Policymakers

25-29 August 2025, 09:00-17:30

Co-hosted with the ICRC, this event aims to enhance the capacity of academics to teach and research international humanitarian law, while also equipping policymakers with an in-depth understanding of ongoing legal debates.

Read more

A session of the UN Human Rights Council Project

IHL Expert Pool

Started in January 2022

The IHL-EP works to strengthen the capacity of human rights mechanisms to incorporate IHL into their work in an efficacious and comprehensive manner. By so doing, it aims to address the normative and practical challenges that human rights bodies encounter when dealing with cases in which IHL applies.

Read more

Iraq, Mosul. View of the west bank after the war. Project

IHL in Focus

Started in January 2024

As a yearly publication, it keeps decision-makers, practitioners and scholars up-to-date with the latest trends and challenges in IHL implementation in over 100 armed conflicts worldwide – both international and non-international.

Read more

Cover of the 2023 Geneva Academy Annual Report Publication

Annual Report 2023

published on July 2024

Read more